Former Judge Sues Woodbridge Police Dept., Alleging Racial Bias

WOODBRIDGE, NJ — Former Middlesex County Superior Court judge Carlia Magpantay Brady tried to collect five years of back pay from the period she was suspended from the bench, but a federal judge ruled against her last week, Law.com and MyCentralJersey both reported.

However, a lawsuit she filed against the Woodbridge Police Department has not yet been resolved.

Brady was New Jersey's first Filipino American to become a Superior Court judge and she lived in Woodbridge. In 2013, when she was 41, she was arrested on charges that she hid her boyfriend, Jason Prontnicki, in her Woodbridge home. Prontnicki was wanted by police for robbing Woods Pharmacy in Old Bridge; he threatened the drug store owner with a crowbar while demanding pills, said police.

Brady and Prontnicki had been involved in a romantic relationship for about six months, and he was living with the judge in her home.

According to the Somerset County Prosecutor, Brady knew there was a warrant for Prontnicki's arrest, but she specifically hid him in her home on June 10 and June 11, 2013. The prosecutor said she gave Woodbridge Police, who were looking for Prontnicki, "intentionally vague" information about Prontnicki's whereabouts on those dates. The Somerset County Prosecutor also said Brady knew of the arrest warrant on her former boyfriend, yet still offered to help him get money and transportation to avoid arrest.

Brady was charged with second-degree official misconduct and two counts of third-degree hindering apprehension. She was removed from the bench immediately after her arrest, and she was indicted in 2015.

Prontnicki was later sentenced to 10 years in prison for the pharmacy robbery.

Gov. Chris Christie appointed Brady to be a Supreme Court judge in Middlesex County.

"If the accusations about a sitting Superior Court judge are true, then the conduct is deplorable and frankly, stupid," Christie reportedly said when she was first arrested.

Brady pleaded not guilty and four years later, all the criminal charges against her were dismissed.

Initially, Brady was removed from the bench indefinitely, but the New Jersey Supreme Court said she could be reinstated as a Superior Court judge after all the charges against her were dropped.

However, Brady claimed she suffered serious health problems and became permanently disabled because of the criminal prosecution against her. In 2020, she applied for permanent disability, saying she had post-traumatic stress disorder, was bipolar II and had major depression and anxiety, caused by the unsuccessful criminal prosecution and the stress of being removed as a judge. Gov. Phil Murphy and the NJ Supreme Court approved her for disability retirement, and she began receiving disability retirement benefits in 2021, according to court records.

Then Brady tried to also collect her pension, which was $141,750 a year, for life, which was three-fourths of her $189,000 yearly salary as a judge.

But a New Jersey appellate court ruled in their Nov. 12, 2025 decision that Brady could not collect the pension because she only served a short time as a Superior Court judge. They also said she "dishonored the bench."

"After dishonoring the bench just over two months into her relatively brief judicial service, a lifetime pension amounting to three-fourths of her judicial salary would be an unwarranted windfall," wrote the appeals court. "The very short length of service, coupled with the serious breach of public trust committed by (Brady), outweighed her entitlement to a lifetime pension."

After that, she filed a federal lawsuit seeking to be paid the back pay for the five years in which she was not allowed to be a judge, but a federal judge ruled Oct. 2 she was not entitled to it. She was seeking more than $780,000 in back pay, Law.com reported.

Brady also sued the Woodbridge Police Dept. for false arrest, malicious prosecution and racial bias because she is Filipino-American. The last report on her lawsuit against Woodbridge Police is that it was headed to federal appeals court. That was in January 2026.

Brady received her undergraduate degree from Rutgers College and her law degree from Seton Hall University School of Law.

Pension Denied For Middlesex County Judge Accused Of Hiding Her Boyfriend From Woodbridge Police (Nov. 2025)